St. Nerses the Gracious (Shnorhali) also wrote a very long prayer in verse, entitled Jesus the Son. Here are the opening lines:

Jesus, the only-begotten Son of the Father,And the Ray of the Appearance;Thou, ineffable offspring of the Archetype,Inseperable from thy Begetter;Thou, by whom all beings are created:The intelligible who are unseen;The disembodied, and the embodied;The irrational, as with the rational;The living things, that grow;And the lifeless, that do not move:All these offer thanksgivingUnto thy loving Father and unto thee;And unto thy coexistent SpiritAre proffered exaltations on highFrom the elect ones most pureThat are admitted unto thine abode.Receive me also with them, O Lord,I who have disobeyed the commandment;I who am like unto the prodigal son,And the waster of thy Father's goods;Who ignored the honour that came from thee,And became the equal unto the brainless one,I who graze the herd of swinein the field of demons;I who am famished, not of hunger for bread,But to hear thy word, O Lord,Ardently desiring carob,the bitterest among the sweet sins.

O Lord,who doest dwell under the protection of the Most High, protect us beneath the shadow of the wings of your loving kindness.

You who doest hear all , hear the prayers of thy servants in your loving kindness and Have mercy upon us.

Christ our Saviour, grant us an evening full of peace and a night of holiness ,for though art the King of glory.

To thee our eyes are turned, pardon our offences and sins and in this world and the world to come,Have mercy upon us.

Lord,let thy right hand rest upon us all the days of our lives ,and thy peace reign among us and give hope and salvation to the souls of those who pray to thee.

By the prayers of Mary who bore thee and of all the saints,pardon me Lord,and Have mercy upon me , O God !

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Can any one find out if this prayer is found in Armenian , Coptic tradition ? Also, though I know this prayer is found in Syrian tradition in India , Is this prayer found in the Syrian prayer book found in Syria and attributed to St. Severus?

I love those prayers. The one for the sixth day is my favorite, as it tells what our Savior did for us on the Cross:

Friday, The Sixth Day: The Crucifixion of our Lord

He who is good by nature,not enduring to have alone the ineffable good,created man in his own imagein the morning of the sixth day;and in the third hour he gave the one born of the ribsas helper to the one born of the earthand he put them in paradise to enjoy,but he forbade them the fruit of death.

After the transgression Adam of oldwas struck dumb before the Judgeputting the blame on the woman for the guileand the woman on the treacherous serpent,because of which this earth was cursed,thorns and thistle grew therein,sentence of death was given to manthat he should return to earth from which he was created.

The Father of glory made haste to abolishthe record of our debt of transgressions,therefore the merciful Son in the sixth agetook upon himself the body of sin;according to the good pleasure of the Fatherhe came willingly to the death of the Cross on Friday,the Lamb was slain on the old Passover,instead of the Lambs that prefigured him.

By the luminous way of the commandmentand by the path of righteousnessthou, lifting thyself up on the Cross,didst lift us up to heaven;through thine unspeakable humilityand crucifixion willingly suffered,0 Lord, be reconciled with us in thy compassionand in thy mercy forgive us our sins.

0 Lord, who art terrible to the seraphimand fearful to the cherubim,thou didst humble thyself to endure sufferingsin the passible human nature;thou didst kill sin on the Crossand didst make void the sentence of death;reconcile with us. Lord, in thy compassionand in thy mercy forgive us our sins.

Thou art supreme over the natures of beingsand art the Maker of all;when thou wilt raise up the sign of thy Crossin thy second coming,them that now worship thee in faithenlighten with the light of thy Cross,so that in concord with them that have put on the Crosswe may bless thee for evermore.

On the website of the Catholicosate of Cilicia, I found an English translation to this ancient preface to the prayers:

THE “PREFACE” TO HAWATOV KHOSTOVANIM [“WITH FAITH I CONFESS”]BY ST. NERSES THE GRACIOUS (1102-1173)*

Translated by Abraham Terian

ADMONITORY PREFACE TO THE PRAYER WRITTEN BY LORD NERSESTHE BROTHER OF CATHOLICOS GRIGOR OF THE ARMENIANS

A prayer of every Christian, to the old and the young, which all ought to learn and to teach one another: priests to the people, fathers to sons, mothers to daughters, and friend to friend. And they should pray using this [prayer] five times a day, kneeling down twelve times at the hour [of prayer], that is: on the morning, at noon, in the afternoon, in the evening and when retiring. But if one becomes slothful and lazy to pray five times, let him pray four times, or three times, or two times, or once a day; at least to realize that one is a Christian, and to come to know oneself that he is a creature of God and worshiper of Him. And if one is slow to learn every word of the prayer (there are those who learn demonic songs with much eagerness), let him learn half of it or less. If they were to learn three of its stanzas and to pray kneeling down three times at the hour [of prayer], it would be acceptable to God. But if any Christian is indifferent about learning and praying this, he should be rebuked and [deemed] as of the company of the Gentiles. Those who teach this prayer to others shall not succumb even in war, much less in peace.

As for our people, they never mention the name of God outside a place of worship, for they do not care about the orders of prayer as befits worshipers of God; rather, they prefer vain talk over prayer. And if at times some were to come to pray before the priest, they either stand with their mouths shut or chatter with one another; for they neither know the words of prayers nor allow the priests to concentrate on psalms and worship. For this reason we wrote this prayer in simple and clear words, so as to be easily understood, for the dull are slow to understand. In not too many words, it has twenty-four stanzas, in accordance with the hours of day and night and the number of prophets, and it is conceptually powerful – since it encompasses more than the needs for which we petition God.

And we offer it to our people to learn, that every Christian may learn this. And wherever they meet at the hour of prayer, they may speak with God through it – whether in church or at home, whether at rest or at whatever work, or when traveling. And all those who learn it and pray attentively, with a passionate heart and with tears, they shall have every request written in it fulfilled to them in life as well as after death. But those who despise it and neither learn nor pray, they shall themselves see the harm done to themselves. We have exhausted our reasons for coming up with this prayer – so that they will no longer make excuses that “we don’t know a prayer’s words, therefore we don’t pray”. Let such people know that Satan makes no greater effort to prevent our various acts of benevolence as [he does to prevent] prayer, for he knows that only through prayer he is chased away from us and God comes to dwell in us. We shall therefore ask the benevolent God to open the eyes of your minds, that you may willingly learn and pray this, and be loved of God.

And when you pray, remember Grigor the Catholicos of the Armenians and his brother Nerses, the author of this prayer, before Christ. And those of you who copy this prayer in writing, copy also these words of admonition. And those who copy this shall be registered in the book of eternal life. And those who shall learn and pray shall receive mercy from Christ. Those who teach their friends shall be rewarded by God. And those who copy it, let them not confuse any letter or word, departing from the original copy, or omit [anything] when copying, lest the words become distorted. Rather, let all [copies] be alike, whenever copied. As for those not skilled in lettering, let them give it to those trained in orthography to copy.

Glory to Christ, forever. Amen.

__________________________*The Armenian text of this rarely encountered preface is found in several ancient manuscripts, and in print at the end Girk’ Saghmosats’ Dawt’i [The Psalms of David] (Jerusalem: St. James Press, 1873), pp. 341-344.

Yes. The Coptic hours are very close to those prayed by the original desert monks. Some of the prayers are referred to in St. John Cassian and St. John Klimako. They are available as a small book, published by

This prayer in the name of Jesus in Orthodox Church tradition of the Indian /Syrian Church is found in Moonu Noyambu (Ninevah Fast) prayer . Very similar to this is another prayer of closing on each Holy Qurbana ( Posting a link to it).

A beautiful prayer of St. Gregory of Nareg which describes the Holy Church:

This spiritual, heavenly mother of light cared for me as a son more than a earthly, breathing, physical mother could. The milk of her bosom was the blood of Christ. If one were to consider her the image of the Mother of God, it would not be impious. Like the sign of the cross of salvation with amazing powers and handiwork, it performs miracles. The terrifying tribunal of the last judgment is established there visibly. Through her the babbling mouths of immoral heretics are silenced. She also has intelligent, speaking stones, by which she chases away the beastly and unclean.78 She gives birth to godly mortals,79 saints in the image of the sole God, Christ.80 She faces east, our first place of habitation.81 She points the way to the second coming of God, and making us face east guides us toward the Lord’s brilliant light.82 The dawn and rising of the sun foreshadow for the creatures of earth the vision of Christ on the day of the last judgment. She drives away pain, heals the infirm, overcomes the tyranny of demons. Like a jubilant bridal party the twelve apostles encircle her the life-giving fountain, the womb of life. So much have her blessings and bliss increased and flourished that she has been called by the name of the Savior himself83 and by those close to the only begotten Son, she was consecrated in the name the radiant Mother of God. For sinners tossing about on the sea, she is a safe harbor; for the heavenly choirs, a place of jubilation. For the perplexed mortal, a place of sure healing. The Holy Trinity, beyond telling, is glorified in her, the blessed in all.

By no means, O Lord, shall I be kept from turning to the Lord because of controversies that are like a small ship of the soul cast about on a stormy sea besieged by crowded waves and abandon you in the abyss of destruction.

I belong to Malankara (Indian) Orthodox Syrian Church. My favourite prayer in our church (we follow syriac orthodox tradition) is private prayer of the priest during the fraction of Holy Mysteries

The Prayer of Breaking and Signing of the Holy Mysteries by Dionysius Bar Salibi

Thus truly the Word of God did suffer in flesh, and was sacrificed and broken on the Cross, and His soul separated from His Body, while His Godhead never separated neither from His Soul nor from His Body. And He was pieced in His side with a spear, and there flowed out of Him blood and water, the atonement of the whole world. And his Body was stained with them. And for the sin of the whole world, the Son died on the Cross, and His Soul came and united with His Body. And He turned us from the work of the left to that of the right. And by the Blood of His Person, He reconciled, united and combined the heavenly with the earthly, the people with the gentiles and the Soul with the Body. And on the third day, He rose from the tomb. One is Emmanuel, and cannot be divided into two natures after the indivisible unity. Thus we believe and thus we confess and thus we confirm that this Flesh is of this Blood and that this Blood is of this Flesh.

This is a wonderful thread. I just ordered St. Gregory of Nareg's Lamentations from Amazon. Is there a liturgy attributed to him? If so, I bet it is very beautiful, and very long. I've noticed that the further east you go, the longer the prayers get.

Logged

Quote from: GabrieltheCelt

If you spend long enough on this forum, you'll come away with all sorts of weird, untrue ideas of Orthodox Christianity.

Quote from: orthonorm

I would suggest most persons in general avoid any question beginning with why.

I belong to Malankara (Indian) Orthodox Syrian Church. My favourite prayer in our church (we follow syriac orthodox tradition) is private prayer of the priest during the fraction of Holy Mysteries

The Prayer of Breaking and Signing of the Holy Mysteries by Dionysius Bar Salibi

Thus truly the Word of God did suffer in flesh, and was sacrificed and broken on the Cross, and His soul separated from His Body, while His Godhead never separated neither from His Soul nor from His Body. And He was pieced in His side with a spear, and there flowed out of Him blood and water, the atonement of the whole world. And his Body was stained with them. And for the sin of the whole world, the Son died on the Cross, and His Soul came and united with His Body. And He turned us from the work of the left to that of the right. And by the Blood of His Person, He reconciled, united and combined the heavenly with the earthly, the people with the gentiles and the Soul with the Body. And on the third day, He rose from the tomb. One is Emmanuel, and cannot be divided into two natures after the indivisible unity. Thus we believe and thus we confess and thus we confirm that this Flesh is of this Blood and that this Blood is of this Flesh.

Here are some prayers from the Sunrise Service (Prime) of the Armenian Church. The prayers were written by St. Nerses Shnorhali in the 12th century.

O Light! Creator of light, primal light that dwellest in unapproachable light, O heavenly Father, blessed art Thou by the ranks of the luminous ones. At the rising of the morning light, shine forth upon our souls Thine intelligible light.

O Light! Born of the Light, righteous Sun, ineffable generation, Son of the Father, Thy name is praised with the Father before the sun. At the rising of the morning light, shine forth upon our souls Thine intelligible light.

O Light! Procession from the Father, source of goodness, Holy Spirit of God, the children of the Church praise Thee together with the angels. At the rising of the morning light, shine forth upon our souls Thine intelligible light.

O Light! Triune and one indivisible Holy Trinity, we, born of the earth, glorify Thee always together with the heavenly hosts. At the rising of the morning light, shine forth upon our souls Thine intelligible light.

Beautiful prayer. It seems like the counterpart of the "Phos Hilaron" which is sung in Byzantine rite Vespers.

Logged

Apart from moral conduct, all that man thinks himself able to do in order to become acceptable to God is mere superstition and religious folly. - Immanuel Kant

Here are some prayers from the Sunrise Service (Prime) of the Armenian Church. The prayers were written by St. Nerses Shnorhali in the 12th century.

O Light! Creator of light, primal light that dwellest in unapproachable light, O heavenly Father, blessed art Thou by the ranks of the luminous ones. At the rising of the morning light, shine forth upon our souls Thine intelligible light.

O Light! Born of the Light, righteous Sun, ineffable generation, Son of the Father, Thy name is praised with the Father before the sun. At the rising of the morning light, shine forth upon our souls Thine intelligible light.

O Light! Procession from the Father, source of goodness, Holy Spirit of God, the children of the Church praise Thee together with the angels. At the rising of the morning light, shine forth upon our souls Thine intelligible light.

O Light! Triune and one indivisible Holy Trinity, we, born of the earth, glorify Thee always together with the heavenly hosts. At the rising of the morning light, shine forth upon our souls Thine intelligible light.

Beautiful prayer. It seems like the counterpart of the "Phos Hilaron" which is sung in Byzantine rite Vespers.

Phos Hilaron, IIRC, comes from St. Athenogenes, who was Armenian. He sang it before the pagans burned him alive.

Logged

Quote from: GabrieltheCelt

If you spend long enough on this forum, you'll come away with all sorts of weird, untrue ideas of Orthodox Christianity.

Quote from: orthonorm

I would suggest most persons in general avoid any question beginning with why.

This is a wonderful thread. I just ordered St. Gregory of Nareg's Lamentations from Amazon. Is there a liturgy attributed to him? If so, I bet it is very beautiful, and very long. I've noticed that the further east you go, the longer the prayers get.

I don't know where the joke originated, but in the Russian church we say, "why use one word when 10 will do?"

I particularly love the imagery of intoxication--an allusion to the notion of "spiritual/sober drunkenness"--which seems to be popular in Syrian Orthodox descriptions of elevated states of spiritual experience.

The part about "increase my faith" reminds me of one of the Roman Catholic rosary prayers--"Increase my Faith; Strengthen my Hope; and inflame my heart with the fire of Divine Love."

I thought this prayer would be particularly helpful to those of us who are still in our years of study, and also generally helpful to all of us in our capacity as students of the Church struggling in our pursuit to learn her way; the way of the Fathers; the way of Wisdom and Salvation.

[I copied this prayer from an Armenian Orthodox website; it was one of the few prayers that were presented without any reference to an original source. Maybe Salpy can help us find out more about the source of these blessed words of the Spirit.]

St. Kyrillos VI's prayer before exams:

My Lord Jesus Christ, I thank You for You have taught me to seek refuge in You, in times of need, when You said “Call upon Me in the day of your trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify Me.”Now, Oh Lord, I appeal to You to give me wisdom and understanding at this time of exams.Give me grace to pass this test in peace. Grant me Your profound peace and blessings in the time that I am writing my test.Lord Jesus, I ask of You to find favor in my teachers’ eyes for You soften their hearts towards me as they mark my papers. Dear Lord, I am a sinner, and I have not pleased You or myself all year, but I ask You not to treat me according to my sins or hardness of heart, but according to Your mercy and sympathy.Lord, You said, “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.” So, here I am, asking, and on the gate of Your mercy I am knocking. So, do not refuse my prayer, for you have said: “whoever comes to Me I will never drive away.” Answer me, through the intercessions of the Holy Virgin and all Your angels.Amen

« Last Edit: May 09, 2014, 02:01:19 AM by Severian »

Logged

"These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." -The Lord Jesus Christ

"I don’t know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve!" -Bilbo Baggins, The Fellowship of the Ring

When you have extended your hands and taken the body, bow, and put your hands before your face, and worship the living Body whom you hold. Then speak with him in a low voice, and with your gaze resting upon him say to him:

I carry you, living God, who is incarnate in the bread, and I embrace you in my palms, Lord of the worlds whom no world has contained. You have circumscribed yourself in a fiery coal within a fleshly palm–you Lord, who with your palm measured out the dust of the earth. You are holy, God incarnate in my hands in a fiery coal which is a body. See, I hold you, although there is nothing that contains you; a bodily hand embraces you, Lord of natures whom a fleshly womb embraced. Within a womb you became a circumscribed body, and now within a hand you appear to me as a small morsel.

As you have made me worthy to approach you and receive you—and see, my hands embrace you confidently—make me worthy, Lord, to eat you in a holy manner and to taste the food of your body as a taste of your life. Instead of the stomach, the body’s member, may the womb of my intellect and the hand of my mind receive you. May you be conceived in me as you were in the womb of the Virgin. There you appeared as an infant, and your hidden self was revealed to the world as corporeal fruit; may you also appear in me here and be revealed from me in fruits that are spiritual works and just labors pleasing to your will.

And by your food may my desires be killed; and by the drinking of your cup may my passions be quenched. And instead of the members of my body, may my thoughts receive strength from the nourishment of your body. Like the manifest members of my body, may my hidden thoughts be engaged in exercise and in running and in works according to your living commands and your spiritual laws. From the food of your body and the drinking of your blood may I wax strong inwardly, and excel outwardly, and run diligently, and so attain to the full stature of an interior human being. May I become a perfect man, mature in the intelligence residing in all my spiritual members, my head being crowned with the crown of perfection of all of my behavior. May I be a royal diadem in your hands, as you promised me, O hidden God whose manifestness I embrace in the perfection of your body.

Logged

Vain existence can never exist, for "unless the LORD builds the house, the builders labor in vain." (Psalm 127)

If the faith is unchanged and rock solid, then the gates of Hades never prevailed in the end.

O Lord,who doest dwell under the protection of the Most High, protect us beneath the shadow of the wings of your loving kindness.

You who doest hear all , hear the prayers of thy servants in your loving kindness and Have mercy upon us.

Christ our Saviour, grant us an evening full of peace and a night of holiness ,for though art the King of glory.

To thee our eyes are turned, pardon our offences and sins and in this world and the world to come,Have mercy upon us.

Lord,let thy right hand rest upon us all the days of our lives ,and thy peace reign among us and give hope and salvation to the souls of those who pray to thee.

By the prayers of Mary who bore thee and of all the saints,pardon me Lord,and Have mercy upon me , O God !

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Can any one find out if this prayer is found in Armenian , Coptic tradition ? Also, though I know this prayer is found in Syrian tradition in India , Is this prayer found in the Syrian prayer book found in Syria and attributed to St. Severus?

The Common Prayer of the Syriac Orthodox Church is known as the 'shimo. The above prayer is part the Soothoro of the shimo. You can listen to this 'Ma'anith Of Saint Severus Patriarch Of Antioch' chanted in Syriac in this CD track number 7

Why did you not cry, pleading with those who are about to murder you, that they may free you? Why did you not acquiesce to their demands?

Did they not propose that you abandon your Christ? Wouldn’t they have had mercy on you had you accepted their religion?

Do you not fear death?! Whence did you acquire this courage?

What theological training did you obtain? From what seminary did you graduate? What monastery did you frequent? What clerical rank do you carry?

Tell me, how did you not resist death? I do not know your secret.

Did you see (Christ) transfigured? Perhaps you heard Him? Truly, I do not know. The only certainty is that when you decided to utter your last words, those sweet words were “Oh my Lord, Jesus Christ.”

I come to you weeping. I do not weep on your account, for men who received crowns do not warrant sorrowful tears. I weep because of you.

For when the light of your faith became manifest, my weakness became apparent before my eyes. And I realized that the veils of darkness do not obscure the vision of God. I realized that He searches the heart and the inner parts. I realized that He knows the faith that resides within each seemingly destitute and abandoned vessel. And I realized that I am not prepared or worthy of this gift which you have attained.

Intercede for us, O righteous men, that He may have mercy on us through your prayers. Ask Him that He may guide us on the way of your faith, so that we may come to know your mystery.